Tip #314: Nonviolent Communication #5: Express Feelings

In last week’s Tip, I posed a test of your ability to distinguish observation from evaluation. The statements in bold print are observations only. If the statement leaves you wondering what it means or why it was said, it is probably an evaluation.

1. Julie left our meeting in a huff for no reason. [Evaluation- what does it mean?]
2. Last night Linda knitted a sweater while watching her daughter’s karate lesson.
3. Tori did not listen to my advice at lunch.
4. My mother is a wonderful artist. [Evaluation- why do you say this?]
5. Michell argues too much. [Evaluation-what do you mean?]
6. Zelda is very assertive when faced with conflict. [Evaluation- why do you say this?]
7. Billy was the last one out the door every day last week.
8. My granddaughter often forgets to wash her hands before a meal. [Evaluation- what do you mean?]
9. Anna told me that red isn’t my color.
10. My friend complains when we get together. [Evaluation- what do you mean?]

“We must become acquainted with our emotional household: we must see our feelings as they actually are, not as we assume they are. “ Vernon Howard

According to Dr. Marshall Rosenberg in Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life, the second component of Nonviolent Communication requires that we learn how to express how we are feeling.

This is difficult, because many of us have been taught to value thinking instead of feeling. As a matter of fact, expressions of feeling in the workplace have typically been considered unprofessional- and expressions of feeling by men in any situation considered evidence of weakness. We tend to spend our energy trying to figure out what other people want rather than how we feel about it, particularly if we are women.

The first step is to distinguish feelings from thoughts. We often use the word feel without actually expressing a feeling. For example, in the sentence, “I feel that I was overlooked for promotion,” the words “I feel” can just as easily be replaced with “I think.”

In general, feelings are not typically expressed when the word feel is followed by:

1. Words such as that, like, and as if:

“I feel that you should think before you act.”
“I feel like I’m falling.”
“I feel as if I can do nothing right.”

2. The pronouns I, you, he, she, they, and it:

“I feel I am waiting for nothing.”
“I feel it is ridiculous.”

3. Names or nouns that refer to people:

“I feel Charles doesn’t care about his family.”
“I feel my employee is procrastinating.”

In fact, we don’t even need to use the word feel when we want to express a feeling. We can simply say, “I’m feeling angry” or even “I’m angry.”

NVC distinguishes between words that express real feelings and those that describe what we think we are.

For example, when I say, “I feel incapable of doing a good job as a parent,” I am evaluating my ability to parent rather than speaking about how that makes me feel.
However, when I say, “I feel anxious about my parenting skills,” I am expressing my actual emotion.

We also need to differentiate between words that describe what we feel and words that describe how we think others react or behave toward us.

For example, when I say, “I feel unworthy in this group of go-getters,” I am really saying that I think the group considers me unworthy. A statement of my actual feeling in this situation might be, “I feel anxious” or “I feel bewildered.”

When I say, “I feel taken for granted,” I am really interpreting the actions of others rather than clearly stating how I feel. A statement of my feeling in this situation might be, “I feel disappointed” or “I feel resentful.”

Words like taken for granted express how we interpret others rather than how we feel.

If we want to express our feelings, we need to use words that refer to specific emotions. If I say, “I feel good about that,” the word good is too general. It could mean happy, excited, relieved, or some other emotion. Words that are vague or general make it difficult for the listener to know what we are really feeling.

Let’s check your ability to identify statements that express feelings rather than thoughts, assessments or interpretations. Which of the following statements express feelings?

1. “I feel you don’t want me here.”
2. "I’m glad that you’re back home.”
3. “I feel angry when you do that.”
4. “When you don’t invite me to dinner with your friends, I feel rejected.”
5. “I’m terrified about the situation.”
6. “You’re infuriating.”
7. “I feel like hugging her.”
8. “I feel misunderstood.”
9. “I feel bad about what he did.”
10. “I’m useless.”

If you email your answers to me at dlaurel@laurelandassociates.com with NVC Answers in the subject heading, I will send you two lists to help you build a vocabulary for feelings: how we feel when our needs are being met and how we feel when are needs are not being met.

Next week’s Tip will discuss the third component in Nonviolent Communication, which is to take responsibility for our feelings.

May your learning be sweet.

Tip #313: Nonviolent Communication #4: Observation Without Evaluation

“When we combine observation with evaluation, people are apt to hear criticism.” Marshall B. Rosenberg, Ph.D.

According to Dr. Marshall Rosenberg in

Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life

, the first component of Nonviolent Communication requires that we learn how to observe behavior that affects our sense of well being without evaluating it at the same time.

This does not mean that we must remain completely objective at all times. It just means that we need to keep our observations separate from our evaluations. If we do not keep them separate, our communication will be heard as criticism.

Unfortunately, “for most of us, it is difficult to make observations, especially of people and their behavior, that are free of judgment, criticism, or other forms of analysis.”

For example, we mix evaluation into our observation when we say, “You are too self-critical.” If we want to communicate this observation without evaluation, we might say instead, “When I see you worry about every mistake, I think you are being too self-critical.”

The difference between the first and the second statement is the fact that the speaker takes responsibility for the evaluation in the second statement.

If we say, “Doug procrastinates,” we are using a verb that has an evaluative connotation. We can communicate the same thought without evaluation if we say,
”Doug saves all of his Christmas shopping until Christmas Eve.”

The generalization, “Old people are slow drivers,” is highly evaluative. A more specific observation would be, “No matter what road he is on, my elderly uncle always drives 10 miles below the speed limit.”

We tend to combine evaluation with our observations when we state broad generalizations rather than specific facts and when we offer these statements as if they are the truth rather than simply our opinion.

For example, “If you don’t floss after brushing, you will get gum disease” is an evaluation, while “If you don’t floss after brushing, I worry that you will end up with gum disease” is an observation for which I take ownership because it is just my concern, not an absolute fact.

“Jim is a poor dancer” is an evaluation, while “Jim has stepped on my feet during every dance” is an observation of a specific situation.

“Sue is pretty” is an evaluation while “I like Sue’s looks” is an observation for which I take ownership, since it is just my opinion and not an absolute fact.

By the way, the words: always, never, ever, whenever, at least, etc. can be used to express an observation. For example: “I cannot recall your ever thanking me for my help,” and “I have noticed that whenever Sally eats while watching television, she takes at least an hour to finish her meal” are specific observations.

However, if these same words are used as exaggerations, they combine evaluation with observation and generate defensiveness rather than compassion. For example, the statements: “You are never home” and “He is always unavailable when the real work needs to be done” are both critically evaluative.

Words like frequently and seldom can also contribute to confusing observation with evaluation, because although they sound specific, they really are not. For example, “You seldom agree with me” is an evaluation, while “The last three times I said something, you said the exact opposite” is a more specific observation. “He frequently forgets to call me” is an evaluation, while “He said that he would call me every night last week, but he forgot” is another more specific observation.

In summary, if we want to separate observation from evaluation, we need to make observations that are specific in terms of their time and context.

Let’s test your ability to distinguish observation from evaluation. Which of the following statements do you think is an observation only?

1. Julie left our meeting in a huff for no reason.
2. Last night Linda knitted a sweater while watching her daughter’s karate lesson.
3. Tori did not listen to my advice at lunch.
4. My mother is a wonderful artist.
5. Michell argues too much.
6. Zelda is very assertive when faced with conflict.
7. Billy was the last one out the door every day last week.
8. My granddaughter often forgets to wash her hands before a meal.
9. Anna told me that red isn’t my color.
10. My friend complains when we get together.

If you email your answers to me at dlaurel@laurelandassociates.com with NVC Answers in the subject heading, I will send you a list of NVC Resources.

Next week’s Tip will discuss the second component in Nonviolent Communication, which is to express how we are feeling.

May your learning be sweet.

Tip #312: Nonviolent Communication #3: Blocked Compassion

“Most of us grew up speaking a language that encourages us to label, compare, demand, and pronounce judgments rather than to be aware of what we are feeling and needing.” Marshall B. Rosenberg, Ph.D.

According to Dr. Marshall Rosenberg in

Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life,

many of us have learned to use “life-alienating communication” that leads us to speak and behave in ways that injure others and ourselves. It is “life-alienating” because it distracts, distances and deflects both parties from their true feelings and needs. Please note that all quoted material in the paragraphs that follow is taken from Dr. Rosenberg's book.

Moralistic Judgments. “You’ll never be good enough.”

Judging statements include blame, insults, put-downs, labels, criticism, comparisons, and diagnoses. When we cast judgments, “we think and communicate in terms of what is wrong with others for behaving in certain ways or, occasionally, what is wrong with ourselves for not understanding or responding as we would like.”

Moralistic judgments are life-alienating because “our attention is focused on classifying, analyzing, and determining levels of wrongness rather than on what we and others need and are not getting.”

For example, “If my colleague is more concerned about details than I am, he is ‘picky and compulsive.’ On the other hand, if I am more concerned about details than he is, he is ‘sloppy and disorganized.’ ”

When we express our values and needs in terms of judgments, one of two things happens. Either the other person becomes defensive and resistant, or that person gives in because they feel afraid, guilty or ashamed.

“Had we been raised speaking a language that facilitated the expression of compassion, we would have learned to articulate our needs and values directly, rather than to insinuate wrongness when they have not been met. For example, instead of ‘Violence is bad,’ we might say instead, ‘I am fearful of the use of violence to resolve conflicts; I value the resolution of human conflicts through other means.’ ”

Making Comparisons. “No one can ever be too rich or too thin.”

This type of thinking blocks compassion both for ourselves and for others, because someone always falls short in a comparison.

Denial of Responsibility. “The Devil made me do it!”

We deny responsibility for our actions whenever we attribute our actions to external factors, such as:

* Vague, impersonal forces: “I went to work because I had to.”
* Our condition, diagnosis, or personal or psychological history. “I abuse drugs because of my bad childhood.”
* The actions of others: “You made me do that.”
* The dictates of authority: “ I tabled the motion because the major asked me.”
* Group pressure: “I started drinking because all of my friends were doing it.”
* Institutional policies, rules and regulations: “I have to suspend your membership because that’s our policy.”
* Gender roles, social roles, or age roles: “I hate staying up until my teenager comes home, but I do it because I’m a caring parent.”
* Uncontrollable impulses: “I couldn’t help myself.”

When we deny the fact that we have a choice about how we behave, think and feel, we become a danger to ourselves and to others.

Demands. “You better do what I tell you to do.”

A demand explicitly or implicitly threatens listeners with blame or punishment if they fail to comply.

Just Desserts. “You made your bed, now lie in it.”

The concept that certain actions deserve to be rewarded and others deserve to be punished is also associated with life-alienating communication.

When we use life-alienating communication, we evaluate others and ourselves in a critical and damaging fashion.

The first component of Nonviolent Communication requires that we learn how to observe behavior without evaluating it. That will be the focus of next week’s Tip.

May your learning be sweet.

Tip #311: Nonviolent Communication #2: NVC Defined

“What I want in my life is compassion, a flow between myself and others based on a mutual giving from the heart.” Marshall B. Rosenberg, Ph.D.

What is nonviolent, or compassionate, communication (NVC)? According to Dr. Marshall B. Rosenberg, in his

Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life:

While we may not consider the way we talk to be ‘violent,’ words often lead to hurt and pain, whether for others or ourselves.

NVC guides us in reframing how we express ourselves and hear others. Instead of habitual, automatic reactions, our words become conscious responses based firmly on awareness of what we are perceiving, feeling, and wanting.

We are led to express ourselves with honesty and clarity, while simultaneously paying others a respectful and empathic attention. In any exchange, we come to hear our own deeper needs and those of others.

NVC trains us to observe carefully, and to be able to specify behaviors and conditions that are affecting us. We learn to identify and clearly articulate what we are concretely wanting in any given situation. The form is simple, yet powerfully transformative.

As NVC replaces our old patterns of defending, withdrawing, or attacking in the face of judgment and criticism, we come to perceive ourselves and others, as well as our intentions and relationships, in a new light. Resistance, defensiveness, and violent reactions are minimized.

When we focus on clarifying what is being observed, felt, and needed rather than on diagnosing and judging, we discover the depth of our own compassion. Through its emphasis on deep listening- to ourselves as well as to others- NVC fosters respect, attentiveness, and empathy, and engenders a mutual desire to give from the heart.

... NVC is more than a process or a language. On a deeper level, it is an ongoing reminder to keep our attention focused on a place where we are more likely to get what we are seeking.

The NVC process has four components:

1. We observe the concrete actions that affect our well-being.
2. We state how we feel in relation to what we observe.
3. We express the needs, values, desires, etc. that create our feelings.
4. We request concrete actions in order to enrich our lives.

When we use the NVC process, we may begin by either expressing ourselves or by empathically receiving these four pieces of information from others.

However, it is possible to experience all four pieces of the process without uttering a single word. The essence of NVC is in our consciousness of the four components, not in the actual words that are exchanged.

Why care about NVC? It can be effectively applied at all levels of communication and in diverse situations, including: intimate relationships, families, school, organizations, counseling relationships, diplomatic and business negotiations, and disputes and conflicts of any nature.

It is so powerful and effective that it now serves as a valuable mediation resource for communities around the world that face violent conflicts and severe ethnic, religious or political tensions, including Israel, the Palestinian Authority, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sierre Leone, etc.

Next week, we will continue our discussion of NVC with a look at communication that blocks compassion.

May your learning be sweet.

Tip #310: Nonviolent Communication #1

“Unless, as grandfather would say, ‘we become the change we wish to see in the world,’ no change will ever take place...Changing ourselves begins with changing our language and methods of communication.” Arun Gandhi, grandson of Mahatma Gandhi, co-founder of the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence

I recently saw a wonderful poster in several classrooms at West High School in Madison, Wisconsin. Its message aptly bridges our prior discussion of lifelong learning with our look at the concept of nonviolent communication. The following is adapted from a poem by Nancy R. Smith:

“For every girl who is tired of acting weak when she is strong, there is a boy tired of appearing strong when he feels vulnerable.

For every boy who is burdened with the constant expectation of knowing everything, there is a girl tired of people not trusting her intelligence.

For every girl who is tired of being called over-sensitive, there is a boy who fears to be gentle, to weep.

For every boy for whom competition is the only way to prove his masculinity, there is a girl who is called unfeminine when she competes.

For every girl who throws out her E-Z bake oven, there is a boy who wishes to find one.

For every boy struggling not to let advertising dictate his desires, there is a girl facing the ad industry’s attacks on her self-esteem.

For every girl who takes a step toward her liberation, there is a boy who finds the way to freedom a little easier.”

What a moving observation of the negative impact of the messages communicated to our children.

If there are young children in your life and you would like a copy of this poster, the one I have is titled: CrimethInc. Gender Subversion Kit #69-B and is available at http://www.crimethInc.com

Next week, we will begin a discussion of nonviolent communication by considering how Dr. Marshall B. Rosenberg defines it.

May your learning be sweet.

Tip #309: Lifelong Learning at the Fourth Level

“The secret of education lies in respecting the pupil.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

I am a member of the national American Society for Training and Development (ASTD). As a result, I receive a weekly email titled “The Buzz: Training News From Around the World.” It typically includes abstracts of 10 current articles on training approaches, experiences, and results.

The following article was recently posted in “The Buzz” and I thought the idea of creating a fourth level of education to prepare people near retirement for encore careers was absolutely fascinating. So, here it is:


“Harvard Wins Fans for Advanced Leadership Course
Guardian (UK) (01/12/2010) O'Hara, Mary

Harvard University recently held a unique "fourth level" education experiment for people nearing retirement. "Regardless of what you came here with, you'll be leaving with something that is going to continue to grow in directions that you couldn't have anticipated when you arrived," says Jamie Kaplan, the executive director of the Cromwell Center for Disabilities Awareness, a charity in Maine, and one of the first 14 "fellows" to participate in the program.

The Advanced Leadership Initiative (Ali) is widely seen as a radical departure from the educational status quo. The program capitalizes on the expanding area of "encore careers," where people nearing retirement actively re-train for a new vocation. Advocates for older people have praised the Harvard initiative, saying it is a model that the higher education establishment should give more attention.

The objective of the program is to develop an additional stage of higher education that harnesses the skills and experience of older adults, builds on those experiences, and catapults the graduates back into some of the most challenging social issues of the day. The current Ali program is limited to a single institution and a small, select group of people, but there is evidence that there is a greater demand for this type of program.

Ali was developed by Harvard Business School professor Rosabeth Moss Kanter, who says the idea is to take people who excelled in their individual fields, put them through an intensive year-long program that incorporates seminars, leadership development, and individual projects to prepare them to re-enter the workplace in a public service capacity.”

It would be wonderful to see this idea spread to other institutions around the country and the world.

May your learning be sweet.

Tip #308: Lifelong Learning with TED

“Curiosity is the wick in the candle of learning.” William A. Ward

So, what is TED? The answer is drawn directly from the TED website.

Chris Anderson, the curator of TED (which stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design), has described it as the place you go to discover how what you do relates to the rest of the world of knowledge that's out there. Anderson says these powerful ideas, from some of the greatest thinkers alive, need to be shared. The website is captioned: “Ideas worth spreading.”

TED was created by design guru Richard Saul Wurman in 1984. Longtime TEDsters (as they call themselves) remember the early years as a sort of platonic ideal of a dinner party, where Wurman would invite every person he would ever want to meet so they could talk, share ideas and get to know one another. From the beginning, TED was also a place for serious business. The Macintosh computer was unveiled at the first TED, and Wired magazine received its first seed money there.

In 2001 Wurman sold TED to tech-publishing multi-millionaire Chris Anderson’s Sapling Foundation, a philanthropic venture that originally aimed to share great ideas for solutions to global crises in public health, the environment, and other areas. Now Sapling’s focus is on magnifying the impact of TED. To accomplish this, he hired June Cohen to create podcasts and then design the website around the talks.

There is a live TED conference held every year, where the presenters are usually held to a strict limit of 18 minutes for their talks. However, you don’t have to attend to benefit from TED. Hundreds of TED talks are now available for free on , with several more added each week. Not only can you watch them, you’re free to download them, post them on your own Web site, or burn a DVD and share them with friends, family and whomever else you want.

Since the first videos became available, the audience has grown to more than 30 million online from around 1,500 a year at the live conference. “We knew that people would be interested, but we really didn’t anticipate that the size of the audience would be so huge, or that the talks would touch people so deeply,” Cohen told Live & Learn.

Speakers talk about the planet’s cultural diversity, the inner workings of the brain, or why we should let second graders play with knives and fire. TED is not afraid to be at the cutting edge, to grapple with groundbreaking, even controversial, topics. The show talks fall under technology, entertainment, design, business, science, or global issues.

You can search for talks that are rated jaw-dropping, persuasive, courageous, ingenious, fascinating, inspiring, beautiful, funny, or informative. All of them are considered “riveting talks by remarkable people.”

Among the most recent talks posted on 2/25/1, you will find: Bill Davenhall on “Your health depends on where you live;” Richard Dawkins on “Growing up in the universe;” Anthony Atala on “Growing new organs;” Robert Sapolsky on “The uniqueness of humans;” Matt Weinstein on “What Bernie Madoff couldn’t steal from me;” Edwidge Danticat on “Stories of Haiti;” Lalitesh Katragadda on “Making maps to fight disaster, build economy;” Sivamani on “Rhythm is everything, everywhere; Kiran Bir Sethi on “Teaching kids to take charge;” and Charles Fleischer on “All things are Moleeds.”

Curious about what a Moleed might be? Check it out at http://www.ted.com!

Next week, we will have one more item about lifelong learning that has recently come to my attention. Then we’ll move on to other topics.

May your learning be sweet.